Thursday, 17 January 2013

The AT&T version of the Lumia 920 and Lumia 820 received the Windows Phone 'Portico' update back in December, along with the HTC 8X. The same update has now started rolling out to the international version of the Nokia handsets.

Nokia is still not over the hard times. The company sold its headquarters and leased it back, laid off 1000 factory workers in Finland, slashed another 4000 but still promised to open up to 4000 new jobs in its Vietnam-based factory.

The Xperia Z is one of the hottest devices in January, but unfortunately runs Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, and not the latest available version of the Google OS (which is 4.2). Sony, however, is going to make things right 'soon after the launch' of its 5" smartphone and update the smartphone to the latest Android version.

RIM will officially launch its new BlackBerry 10 OS and the first smartphones to run it soon (January 30) but the stream of unofficial leaks is turning into a torrent. The latest is a training material intended to teach sales people how to sell the new OS and devices.

Last week we heard plenty of rumors about Apple having cut orders for the new iPhone 5 due to lower than expected demand. While it has gone as far as to affect Apple's stock prices, it may not have been entirely true. According to one analyst Apple were able to ship some 52 million iPhone units in Q4.

While main product lines like the iPhone and iPad are expected to remain strong, specific devices within those lines may fall short of expected sales.

The extremely popular Samsung Galaxy Note II is getting two additional paint jobs - Amber Brown and Ruby Wine. This is surely not surprising for the Note II fans, the info about the new colors leaked on the New Year's Day. Still, now the two new paintjobs are finally official, which means they will probably be heading to a store near you in the coming weeks.

Nokia is launching its Lumia 920 flagship in India today alongside the Lumia 820. The phones will be available in brick and mortar stores as well as through Nokia's online store with free shipping starting tomorrow and will cost $697 and $504 (RS 38,199 and RS 27,599)respectively.

The budget Windows Phone 8 offering Lumia 620 will be available in India from February but the price and exact date aren't available just yet.

The Lumia 920 isn't exactly on the cheap side - you could get a Galaxy S III for less and a Galaxy Note II for about the same. The Lumia flagman is, however, cheaper than a brand new iPhone 5.